Florida Homeowners Association Terror

My neighborhood is stank. When I say “stank” in this context, I’m not referring to the HOA Board, the HOA Property Manager, or the neighbors. Yes, my HOA-governed neighborhood’s HOA, including the property manager, are stank. And surely some people believe that their neighbors are stank (stank in this context means attitude). But I am talking about odor in the neighborhood. It smells bad, intermittently.

I first noticed this stank smell shortly after I moved into my newly built house in 2016. There was this peculiar odor that was most noticeable in the mornings. I would walk around the entire house like a bloodhound sniffing for its location. The nauseating scent is reminiscent of old weed and eggs. It is strong. I do have a really keen sense of smell. I can smell Vaseline and Bandaids. I have been this sensitive my whole life.

I know people in the neighborhood smoke weed. And yes, they smoke that shit outside on the back porch, in the garage and wherever else. However, that isn’t what is stank in this neighborhood. Also, I know that in Florida, we use reclaimed water to maintain our unnecessarily expensive suburban landscape (you know, so we can say we live in a beautifully aesthetically maintained HOA community). That water is stank of sulfur which is what makes eggs stank to some people. But that isn’t it either.

Further north on 301 in Riverview/Wimauma, I was once buying a house in a lovely developing neighborhood called Ayersworth Glen. I rented there intially to see what the neighborhood was like because my weekly trips visiting the area during the afternoon and then again at night were not sufficient. At that time, I also believed that I would be buying my first house and forever home (as a result of my current experiences, I no longer believe in the concept of a forever home in an HOA neighborhood). Over time, I noticed this horrible smell wafting through the air. I cannot remember the details of the smell 14 years later. I only know it was stank. As it turns out, there is a landfill mountain that peaks right next to the neighborhood. My realtor tried to tell me that the smell was not always present. Fuck that. Thankfully, I was able to cancel my contract on the house.

I have often wondered what this land used to be before it was colonized. My go to is typically a Native American burial ground although white people also love to build on top of Black American cemeteries—especially in Tampa. The only thing I have heard is that it used to be farmland. I watched most of this neighborhood get built and saw how they manipulated the landscape and created this fake suburban hellscape. Are we on top of people’s ancestors?

This morning, like many of these recent cold mornings, I decided to open the windows and let some fresh air in. Big mistake. While the air was cool, it was not refreshing. It was stank. Does anyone know what I’m talking about? I gotta get the fuck outta here—just like my HOA wants.